Questions

Have seen that crowdfunding is a challenge because you still have to pay lots of $$ to send traffic to the page to even be seen. Also, concept is an online service so not much to give as gifts for contributions.

There are platforms that allow crowd funding for websites. However, you touched on a very specific point, that even I myself am currently facing. It costs money to get awareness to raise money. So, the best thing to do is narrow your focus for the MVP. Focus, on the most critical problem-solving aspect of your product for the consumer, from there build that, you should significantly reduce your build out costs by doing that. And for the answer the easiest way to get funding is either pay for it yourself (i'm currently doing it, so I understand the pain), or ask friends and family. Also, a huge take away, remember to be mindful of what you are asking for in terms of money. You aren't asking for investment, per say, but more for money to develop the platform. The reason I bring this up, despite what we may feel and think, as the platform does not have clear market fit, we do not have a true way of returning that investment money as of yet.